Category Archives: Canyoning

Yileen & Dargans Creek Canyons (18 Dec 2021)

Summer finally arrived in late December – a hot forecast, instead of November’s incessant rain and cool temperatures. Thanks to Kylie’s instigation of “Summer Slaydies”, five women met up for the first time and did a very enjoyable run through Yileen. It was a pleasure to spend the day with this group and share our love of canyoning.

Expansive views on the way in

Expansive views on the way in

The crew (clockwise): Me, Laura, Monika, Jannice, Lorien. (The best photo of a blurry bunch!)

Green corridor

Small scramble into the depths

Jannice on the first abseil

Laura on the first abseil

Loz abseiling, while everyone else looks on

Beautiful section of canyon

Loz in another corridor

Canyoning is such hard work!

Monika at the bottom of the second abseil

Laura on the final drop

The party following us abseiling the wet line

We were so efficient that we were back at the Pierces Pass Lower Carpark for lunch.

I met up with Tom afterwards and we did a run through Dargans Creek Canyon.

An awkward downclimb with the volume of water obscuring views of the holds

Downclimb in the canyon

Classic canyon formation

Tom trying out a new camera carry method

Apparently the method is a winner

Soaring walls

The first part of the exit

Trademark Dargans – the spiked tree exit route

Jerrara Creek (17 Apr 2021)

Stop the press! James was available for a second canyoning weekend less than 3 months after our last trip. However, true to form, the weather was not looking great for the weekend. I looked at the where the rain was going to be, and suggested heading south might be the best bet.

After a series of indecisive conversations through the week we did make enough decisions to end up on our way to Bungonia on Saturday morning. We had a relatively late start as we’d been discussing Long Gully – and we’d been at the Shoalhaven for lunch when we’d done that trip previously. However, Tom was now angling for Jerrara Creek. It was only while we were driving down that I looked at his notes and saw the 8-11 hour time estimate. Well. With our likely start time we were going to have 8 hours of daylight. Better make sure we all pack our torches, or hope that 2009 Tom who wrote the notes had been over-estimating the time needed.

After doing a lap of the campground (no, it’s not like we’re pressed for time), and the disappointment of finding the Bungonia campground did not permit wood fires (no, I didn’t pack a stove), we left the car at 9:45am. It wasn’t long before we were wet-suiting up in Jerrara Creek. We proceeded pretty smoothly through the canyon.

DSC04998

James abseiling the first drop

DSC05000

Tom & James “enjoying” a swim – not the warmest day!

DSC05003

Impressive drop

DSC05007

Tom on his way down

DSC05009

James descending the same drop

It’s been a while since I’ve done a canyon with a lot of long drops, and even with only 3 of us, I’d forgotten just how it takes to get people down.

DSC05018

James on the first pitch of Jerrara Falls

DSC05026

James at the start of the second pitch of Jerrara Falls

DSC05028

The third pitch of Jerrara Falls

DSC05030

View of Jerrara Falls

We enjoyed the brief periods of sun we got and were pleased to find the clouds had largely cleared in time for lunch.

DSC05032

Lovely lunch spot and time to warm up

We left our lunch spot at 2pm that gave us 3.5 hours till sunset – seemed like we wouldn’t be needing to use the torches – but you never want to be too confident!

DSC05037

Tom descending into the shade

DSC05039

Big country (and another swim looms)

After the swim in the photo above we had a longish section of boulder-scrambling which we moved through pretty efficiently. I was sweltering in my wetsuit and when James joined my pleas we stopped at a lovely spot to get changed. It would have been a nice spot to camp but I was not unhappy to only have our day gear with us – lugging a wet 60m rope makes a pack heavy enough.

DSC05041

This was such a tranquil spot

From there it wasn’t long till we hit the exit. Though I think James was a little dubious about this being an NPWS track given the state of it, particularly at the bottom. My legs haven’t felt so sluggish on a hill in a long time but we made it to the top without really stopping so I can’t be that unfit!

DSC05043

Slogging our way up the Red Track

I think we were back at the car around 5:15pm, so all up 7.5 hours. Perfectly timed really in the end – what with the sun at lunch, and doing the climb out in the shade with the lovely evening light.

Fortunately James had a stove so our night wasn’t a complete disaster, particularly after a bottle of red and some fortified shiraz 🙂

What a Canyon! (13 Mar 2021)

It’s the SBW reunion weekend so of course the forecast is for rain. It’s also an La Niña year. So it’s a lot of rain forecast. Hmmph. The forecast was not looking good for our canyoning plans on Saturday with around 50mm of rain predicted for Thursday & Friday. Tom checks on Friday morning and Robertson has recorded 0mm. Excellent. I wasn’t feeling quite so good when later in the day he checks the surrounding weather stations (Fitzroy Falls & Broger Creek) and they’ve had 50mm. Fingers-crossed that there were some very localised storm cells… and not that the Robertson weather station isn’t working!

I had been contemplating not going – with a multitude of injuries (left wrist, right thumb, calf… ) but when Tom said it was a fairly short day, I decided I’d be able to make it through.

After a couple of delays (failing to download the information on Tom’s phone before dropping out of mobile range, for one) we set off with Jon & Alex. Alex & Tom had attempted this trip some years earlier, on another wet reunion weekend, and bailed because of water levels being too high. Tom has no photos from that trip as he’d drowned his camera the day before – so his memory of what the water was like on that trip was sketchy. The water level looks approachable so we wetsuit up (well except for Alex who is wetsuit-less).

DSC04858

Water looks relatively benign from here

DSC04860

Alex on an early scramble

I was pretty glad to get into the water as it was a humid day (forecast high around 30°C) and I sweaty after just a few minutes. I can’t imagine how Jon was feeling in his steamer.

Jon & I made each other feel so much better about the day by admitting each of us been having “bad feelings” about the trip. Probably brought on by the canyon’s history – a fall/paramedic fatality a few years ago and then last weekend a tree/rockfall narrowly missing a party.

DSC04862

Jon looking somewhat unimpressed

DSC04868

Alex disappearing through a hole in the log jam

DSC04871

Tom trying to find a way through the hole

DSC04874

The team and a pretty section of canyon

DSC04876

Without Tom blocking the view

DSC04877

Canyon

DSC04879

Eternity pool?

Before long we were at the edge of one of nature’s eternity pools. Somehow I got to go first and find out just how much power was in the water flow. Emerging unscathed, other than my camera (the dry bag is definitely no longer a ‘dry’ bag), I was glad it wasn’t any stronger.

DSC04888

Alex emerges from the waterfall

DSC04894

Jon getting smashed

DSC04896

Jon near the bottom

DSC04899

Tom before the worst of it

DSC04903

A bit of boulder scrambling

DSC04909

Tom checking where he’s going

DSC04918

Jon all smiles now

DSC04923

Alex on his way down

DSC04932

Jon wondering where to stop

DSC04937

Tom nearly at the bottom

DSC04942

Not quite at the bottom yet though!

DSC04945

Final short abseil

We had lunch at the bottom of the big fall enjoying the views of the beautiful waterfall.

DSC04947

Lovely cascades

DSC04951

Pretty

From there it was a straight-forward walk out.

DSC04952

Jon on the way out

My main complaint at the end was that we were out too soon after lunch! I hadn’t really worked up an appetite for something from the Robertson Pie Shop. Nonetheless that didn’t stop me indulging in a caramel macadamia tart.

An excellent short day, giving us plenty of time to get to the reunion, enjoy a swim in the river before settling in for a convivial, if occasionally wet, night around the campfire.

Claustral (5 Mar 2021)

Well, this was a luxurious day. We didn’t leave home until 9am, leaving the cars at 11am to start our canyon. As it was a Friday ours was the only car in the car park – and so had the canyon to ourselves.

Tom had requested the late start so we had a better chance of getting sunbeams in the canyon – well we got them. It was a beautiful day, we couldn’t really have asked for better weather. It was clear blue skies on our way in, but by the time we exited it was a bit cooler with some cloud cover.

DSC04809

First abseil into the Black Hole

DSC04814

Second abseil

DSC04819

Sunbeams!

DSC04824

Nice light

DSC04829

Sunbeams

DSC04830

Sunbeams

DSC04832

More sunbeams

DSC04836

Magnificent

DSC04838

More sunbeams

DSC04840

Canyon

DSC04844

Oh wait, more sunbeams

DSC04852

Abseiling down to the tunnel swim

I always find on ‘trade’ routes it’s harder to write an interesting trip report. But, some memorable moments so that in ten years when I re-read this I can remember…

Both Tom & I at different points managed to fall over while standing in the water. We both fell to our left – where our camera case and dry bags were held in our left hands, while keeping our right hands high in the air out of the water – because of course that was where the cameras were! Tom was only in ankle deep water so the case didn’t get so wet, whereas I was in knee deep water and the case & dry bag got a full dunking. So, a lot less photos in the later half of the trip from me as the camera had to go into my main dry bag.

We tried the banh mi (as opposed to “not rolls”!) from My Dad’s Bakery as a lunch option for the first time. It was pretty good, even if the paper bags had largely disintegrated by the time we had lunch at the exit gully (“like the old days” said Tom at the lunch spot choice).

Timings: 11am left car, 2:30pm at exit gully where we had lunch for about half an hour, 5:30pm back at cars. 6.5 hour day – 2 people, who had done canyon multiple times previously, but with a lot of photo-faffing.

Creek exploration (13-14 Feb 2021)

The weather forecast was looking pretty ugly for Friday night – with the Norwegian forecasters predicting 37mm a few days out – the BOM forecast was a more “reasonable” 6-15mm. It didn’t sound particularly compatible with the exploration of a quartzite creek! After much agonising Plan B was enacted which involved a very late start by SBW standards – 10am! As hoped for the rain had largely blown through by the time we started – we didn’t really get much beyond spitting through the rest of the day.

DSC04624

Climbing up through the burnt pagodas

DSC04628

Crossing a void

DSC04629

Lunch in the mizzle (with some views though)

DSC04634

Afternoon excursion

DSC04639

Pleasant creek

DSC04640

Home for the night

DSC04642

The other end of home!

Day 2 we revelled in the open walking across the Morton tops (whoever thought they would hear that phrase in their lifetime!) before we set off with day packs into a creek system I’d been wanting to explore for a while.

DSC04646

Meadow walking across the tops

DSC04652

Starting to look canyony

I thought we might by stymied almost as soon as we got into the creek, as there was a drop that needed a handline – at least at the water levels we encountered. Fortunately Tom was able to meat anchor the rest of the party allowing us to use a line with a few footholds, and then he reset off a natural anchor and had a more difficult descent (but he was the tallest in the group by a fair way). I headed down first to make sure we were going to be able to continue on without issue – which we were – other than getting waist deep wet!

DSC04654

The others negotiating a small drop

DSC04660

Bouldery section of creek

DSC04661

Pink flannel flowers everywhere!

DSC04662

Jon going the sloped route

For the rest of the creek any time we hit a drop that we couldn’t downclimb easily we were able to walk around the top of the creek and find a straight forward way back in.

DSC04666

The guys about to launch (not)

DSC04668

Tom about to launch again (not)

DSC04673

Canyon!

DSC04679

In the canyon

DSC04680

Cascades

DSC04681

Impressive country

DSC04684

On a rocky ledge

DSC04685

Tom kindly clearing the spider webs for the rest of us

DSC04688

Lunch spot

DSC04691

Swim time

DSC04693

Nice section of creek

DSC04698

Spitfire (sawfly larvae) – we saw a lot of these over the weekend

DSC04699

The final creek crossing

Yarramun Canyoning (30-31 Jan 2021)

A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away…. James was a regular canyoning buddy. But since 2012 we’ve averaged less than a trip a year with him (the last one being 2017!!!). So it was with some anticipation that the date which had been locked in months earlier approached. True to our previous attempt at this route the forecast was rubbish. Ok, so maybe not as bad as 2017 where we ended up just doing a tour of waterfalls in the Blue Mountains (I think there had been 100mm of rain). This time it had rained for the three days leading up to the trip, and the forecast for Sunday was for more rain, but nothing too serious – though I was less than impressed when I checked the forecast early on Saturday morning to find a possible severe thunderstorm had crept into late Saturday.

Much to my relief James had volunteered his 4WD as transport for the weekend. We negotiated the road without any issue and it wasn’t long before we’d made our way into our creek system. Given the bush was wet and it was drizzling I suggested we put the wetsuits on as soon as it looked like we were going to be pushing through ferns. It wasn’t long before we were chest-deep, and we were in and out of the water for the rest of the day.

DSC04503

Early shallow canyon

DSC04506

A low section in log & debris soup

DSC04507

One of many log jams to be negotiated through the weekend

DSC04510

Tom & James on a climb down

DSC04514

James abseiling a short drop, as Tom waits around the corner

DSC04515

Tom trying to work out what to anchor off

DSC04518

Tom looking unimpressed. Probably because he choose the awkward abseil start.

DSC04521

James with the somewhat less awkward abseil start

DSC04528

Team work gets an stuck rope unstuck

DSC04529

Tom & James in the canyon

The guys went off to look up a side canyon while I decided to continue downstream to an overhang. Unfortunately in my way was this tiger (?) snake who had no interest in moving. I climbed around him, though by the time the guys came through he had relocated to under the log.

DSC04531

You shall not pass!

DSC04536

James down-climbing

This yabbie appeared to have been caught in the flood debris (of which there was a lot). I feel like there’s a funny caption just waiting to be written – it just hasn’t come to mind yet.

DSC04537

Victim of a flood sometime in the past

DSC04542

Tom in his element (photographing canyon formation)

DSC04551

Swim time

DSC04556

More swimming

Despite the short distance we were intending to cover it took us all day. Admittedly there was a lot of photo-faffing, and James did spend a lot of time waiting for me and Tom… We didn’t emerge into a cave (was it our intended one??) until after 4:30pm. There had been some talk of doing another canyon that afternoon, but not with a 4:30pm arrival – there was port to drink and pistachios/biltong/cheese to eat!

DSC04560

We emerge into a cave

Based on Tom’s underselling of the camp cave and the brief look at the photos from his previous trips I had a pretty low expectation of our intended overnight location.

Fortunately it ended up being very large and well protected (if not overly flat) as a severe thunderstorm came through around 8pm. There was at least one lightning strike where the thunder was almost instantaneous! We were very glad to be sheltered from the storm and well above the creek. After the rain had settled down we went down and checked out the creek level – it was definitely up since we’d cleaned out our shoes earlier in the evening.

DSC04565

But there’s a bigger (if less flat) one round the corner). The last occupants went a bit crazy with stockpiling firewood.

The followers had mutinied and decided on a revised route for day 2. Tom our leader was helpless in the face of the overthrow. After an excellent nights sleep (with no mosquitoes – we didn’t end up using the net despite putting it up) we were off to find our next canyon at 8:20am the next morning. An hour later we dropped into the creek just as the canyon started. And an impressive start it was!

DSC04567

Day 2 – this canyon looks like a cracker!

DSC04568

Tom setting the rope from above

DSC04574

Tom abseiling

DSC04576

Lots of swimming through narrow sections follows

DSC04579

Spider web and moss

DSC04580

Probably the most difficult section. It seemed to take Tom (who had the biggest pack as he had the rope at that stage) about 10 minutes to squeeze his way through here. Though maybe he was just taking photos while grunting!?

DSC04586

Finally he emerges from the narrows

DSC04593

Another short drop. Tom’s sporting a debris beard from a the duck-under (sort of) route we took

DSC04595

Canyon formation

DSC04599

James disappearing through a small gap under (yet another) a log pile up

DSC04600

Go that way!

DSC04603

The water levels were somewhat elevated after the big storm the night before

We got back to the cave in time for an early lunch. Packing up we repeated our route from the morning before heading across the ridges and dropping into yesterday’s creek.

DSC04605

an inconspicuous looking pass

From there we took a side-creek we hadn’t explored the day before which was pretty impressive.

DSC04611

Do the limbo!

DSC04613

Canyon formation

DSC04614

A tunnel

Then it was time to head for the cars. The weather had packed it in by then and we walked in light mizzle for most of the exit.

DSC04618

Great views on our walk out

Back at the cars at 4:30pm was a pretty respectable time to end the day. An excellent weekend, despite the weather, hopefully not another 3 years before we have the opportunity to go canyoning with James again!

Extra long weekend (23-26 Jan 2021)

Australia Day fell on a Tuesday this year so it only made sense to take the Monday off work and turn it into a 4 day long weekend. Tom had a plan which he showed me on the Friday night. The plan was full of caveats that we might go several kilometres up a creek and find an obstacle and not be able to find a pass out and have to retreat. Why not do the trip in the other direction then? Tom listened to me – which turned out to be a poor idea in retrospect…. but I’m getting ahead of myself as we wouldn’t find that out until day 3.

The forecast for the 4 days was for a heatwave over NSW. Temperatures around the area we were going to be in were expected to be around 30°C each day. Subsequently we were hoping to spend most of our time in creeks!

We knocked off the ridge walking to get into our creek system by late morning on day 1, glad to have morning tea in relative cool of the creek.

After that we hit one of the few (only?) keeper potholes I have encountered in the Blue Mountains which looks to operate in keeper mode most of the time. Fortunately it was easily bypassed by abseiling into the creek downstream of it. From there we abseiled and waded our way downstream. We sweltered at times in our wetsuits as the canyon was fairly open and shallow.

DSC04407

Tom on the second abseil in our first canyon

DSC04408

Below the second abseil

DSC04411

Tom abseiling (again)

DSC04414

Tom in the canyon

DSC04416

Tom still in the canyon

After a long section of creek walking we eventually hit what Tom said would be the final abseil. As it turned out we ended up doing another one, but perhaps in more drought-like conditions it could have been down climbed.

DSC04422

The final (not) awkward abseil

DSC04429

Camp night 1

The next day we headed down the several kilometres of creek which might have had an impassable obstacle and no way round. We didn’t find any – which just shows you never know till you go.

DSC04436

Impressive amphitheatre

DSC04438

Tom disturbing a bunch of composting debris

DSC04443

Crossing a wide section of creek

DSC04444

Crossing back again…

DSC04446

Finally something that resembles a canyon

Eventually we decided we should make camp. There had been plenty of options through the day, but as is typical at the point where you start wanting a campsite they dry up. We did employ a fairly inefficient method of finding a campsite, which probably made the whole process take three times as long as it should. However, eventually we found ourselves a nice raised sandbank. It was a very warm evening and even with our mossie net allowing us the luxury of not being mauled by mossies outside our sleeping bags I was still a sweaty mess.

DSC04451

Camp night 2

DSC04452

Happy hour!

DSC04453

Early morning dip on day 3

DSC04458

More wading early on day 3

Our third day was the least “successful”. Our plan to ascend a creek was stymied fairly early on. We managed to bypass one obstacle by climbing high around it, only to hit another obstacle shortly afterwards. Perhaps we could have climbed around it, but there was still a long way to go and the further up we went the longer we’d have to retreat if we got stuck. Reluctantly we bailed out onto the ridge. It wasn’t that far to walk around to the upper section of the creek… but even if it was only a couple of hours with the heat it was pretty oppressive.

DSC04462

The end of our attempt to go up this creek

A late lunch back in the shade of a side canyon was a welcome relief. Unfortunately that episode really took it out of us and we didn’t have a lot of energy left for exploration for the rest of the day.

DSC04464

Some hours later, having survived the blazing heat of the ridges, we are back in a side creek

DSC04466

We are not alone! We followed these footprints for the rest of the day

When we found a not particularly good camp cave at 4pm there was unanimous agreement that we should call it a day. A full body immersion in a pool downstream was welcome, as was the temperature dropping a bit overnight.

DSC04467

Camp night 3

After our experience on the ridge the previous day we agreed to get moving early on day 4. We were walking before 7:30am and decided to roll the dice and ascend another side creek. Fortunately this time luck was on our side and we managed to get almost the whole way up it, and once we were stymied we forced our way out onto the ridge.

DSC04479

Early morning canyon exploration day 4

DSC04481

He’s got the moves like… Jagger!?

We did drop back in and explore the upper section which was very nice canyon, but I didn’t take my camera so no photos!

From there we had the ridge-bash back to Deep Pass, but a reasonable breeze made the temperatures more bearable. We were somewhat surprised to stumble across some gear – particularly since we were on the side of the ridge at the time. I wrote them a “Hi” with stones – whether they noticed it on their return who knows!? To go with the footprints we’d been following it made it feel very busy out there in the wilderness!!

DSC04484

We left this stone message for the owners of this gear we randomly stumbled over on the ridge

DSC04486

Descending back to Deep Pass

We had lunch at Deep Pass and sent a few groups who couldn’t find the “waterfall” in the right direction. Post lunch we ascended Deep Pass Canyon back to the cars – we bumped into a large group near the top – including some people we knew.

DSC04488

Tom proving he still has the nerve in Deep Pass

DSC04492

Deep Pass Canyon

DSC04496

Deep Pass Canyon

DSC04498

Deep Pass Canyon

We got to Pie in the Sky in time to claim their last apple pie (but sadly there was only one not two). A good weekend out even if it not quite going to plan.

Yileen Canyon (16 Jan 2020)

Somehow Tom convinced me to come along and be pack-mule, belay bunny and rope wrangler while he sat about at the top of the abseils and took photos. Good thing it was a great day for it – lovely to have some decent sunshine after so much rain over the Christmas period.

DSC04383

The Toms near the top of the canyon

DSC04384

The team getting into the canyon

DSC04386

Tom C bridging

DSC04387

The Toms negotiating the first obstacle

DSC04389

Sculpted canyon

DSC04391

Tom C hand-over-handing a small drop

DSC04395

Alex, Giles & Tom C

DSC04397

Tom in his element

DSC04398

Waiting for Tom B…

At the end we caught up with another group who were just finishing up lunch. Fortunately they hung around to chat for a bit, as when our rope got stuck Alicia volunteered to climb up and sort it out! Thanks Alicia & Paul/Paul/Josh.

Tom tricked us into walking back to the car via Walls Lookout. We got to watch someone climb Check Ya Head (19) on the opposing wall which looked airy.

DSC04402

A great view of these climbers on “Check Ya Head” from Walls Lookout

We finished off the day with a perfectly timed stop at Pie in the Sky – if we’d been even 5 minutes later we would have been out of luck on the pies as we were the start of a mini-rush hour.

Wentworth Creek (9-10 Jan 2021)

Another trip which I’d cajoled out of Tom when I was seeking walks for the Summer Program. We didn’t know anything about the section we were attempting so I guess it wasn’t that surprising when we couldn’t do the trip as planned.

The weather wasn’t ideal for a wet trip, or at least not on Saturday, when it was grey and cool. With the large amount of recent rain there was plenty of flowing water in the creek. Our feet didn’t stay dry for long, and after a couple of swims I think we were all feeling a little chilly.

DSC04343

Early on in the creek

DSC04344

Walking through an overhang

DSC04346

Slow section

DSC04349

Mark hand-over-hands, while Jo watches on

DSC04350

Looking pretty canyony

DSC04353

Tom & Lauren above a waterfall which needs to be abseiled… we don’t have gear.

Having got to a waterfall that we couldn’t safely get down without abseiling gear we reversed upstream and managed to exit via a side creek.

DSC04355

Lauren reversing up the creek

DSC04358

Lauren & Jo in a side creek/canyon

DSC04359

Forcing a pass out

We had lunch on the cliffs above the creek and marvelled that we’d found a way out given how many cliffs there were. Tom gave us a less than 50% chance of finding a way down the next side creek (without using rope). But we went to check it out. Unfortunately his odds were right and were again stymied.

So we picked up water and headed up the nearest ridge. This area hadn’t been burnt and it was a good reminder on what unburnt bush-basing is like…. To our surprise after a fairly unpleasant ascent the ridge opened out to a delightful series of cliffs with enough flat areas for us to have a great camp. Jo made the unfortunate decision to sleep under the stars, but with the cloud clearing there was a lot of dew and her tent went up just before bed (that didn’t save the sleeping bag which had been out though).

DSC04376

Delightful sunset

DSC04377

Dusk

DSC04378

Dawn

Next morning we had a fairly early start and got back to the cars at 10am. Not quite the planned weekend but good company and fun exploring anyway!

DSC04379

Our camp

A gap in the storms (26-28 Dec 2020)

We had grand plans for a 5-6 day canyoning trip post Christmas. La Niña had other ideas. The forecast between Christmas and New Year alternated between a lot of rain, and a bit of rain, but generally with possible thunderstorms. Having already diced with the weather before Christmas we weren’t overly enthused to take it on in anger again any time soon. Unfortunately the best weather was early on and my visions of lazing around on Boxing Day were dashed as Toni & Smiffy motivated us to get out and join them. At least they had suggested we just meet up in the bush on the evening of the 26th so we didn’t have to get up early on Boxing Day.

Early afternoon we started driving. Part way along Bells Line of Road I had a look at the forecast. “Severe weather warning”. A quick check of the radar showed an intense cell tracking west to east, south of Lithgow. Around Bell we drove into it. Hail and rain smashed down on us. I wondered how much hail you needed to break a windscreen? Most cars were driving at a crawl with their hazard lights on.

20201226_160456

Hail storm on the way

Some cars stopped but the quickest way out of it was to keep driving. By the time we started the descent into Lithgow we could just see the aftermath. Hail all over the road as if it had been snowing. Water pouring off every rock around us. I would not have wanted to be in a canyon constriction. My already weak enthusiasm was being tested.

20201226_160759_HDR

Aftermath of the storm – see how much water/hail is on the road!

Fortunately once we were through the cell it was back to a nice enough day. We left the car at 5pm hoping to be at our pre-arranged meeting spot with Toni & Smiffy by 6:30pm. The thunder started rumbling around us, and I was mentally noting there were a lot of overhangs along the edges of the gully we were ascending. The rain held off and held off, and started teeming down when we were fortunately about 50m away from a decent cave.

DSC04296

A fine place to shelter from another storm!

Tom looks at the map and realises we’re on the wrong side of the gully. After half an hour of dumping the rain stopped and we sauntered all of 5 minutes around the cliffline to find Toni & Smiffy. At which point both parties admit if it hadn’t been for the others we probably would have all been safely tucked up at home!

DSC04297

Eventually we get to our pre-arranged meeting point with Toni & Smiffy

However, the next day rewards us for being out there. A blue sky with no hint of the unsettled weather.

DSC04298

Completely different weather the next day

Eventually we make it down into the creek Tom wants to explore. A sling at the top of the first major drop tells us we’re not the first (though we knew that anyway). With three photographers out of four we don’t set any speed records for our descent. Plus with the storm the night before there was a reasonable water flow, and some blocked up sections to clear out.

DSC04304

A vegetated first abseil

DSC04305

Foam left from the storm the night before

DSC04309

Another vegetated abseil

DSC04312

No vegetation in sight!

DSC04318

Smiffy checking out what’s below

DSC04322

Tom descending into the unknown

When Smiffy & I first got to the top of this drop the pool came up over the slings, but with a bit of clearing of debris we dropped the water level in the pool by over a foot.

DSC04325

Smiffy on the same deep abseil

DSC04326

It’s still going

DSC04327

Canyon formation 🙂

DSC04333

Smiffy photographing Toni on our final abseil

We were glad to find a nice sunny spot to have lunch in as it had been a relatively wet canyon. However, we had a long way to go to get back to our gear.

DSC04340

Checking out another canyon

After a couple of kilometres of creek-bashing we tried to force a pass onto the tops. Tom & I had found a pass some years earlier but we couldn’t remember where it was having not brought any notes with us. After a bit of exploring we couldn’t find a way up, so retreated back to the creek having lost half an hour. Several more kilometres of creek-bashing it was to be then. Fortunately, unlike our pre-Christmas trip, this creek did get easier the higher we went and we got back to our gear at 7pm…. still plenty of light, but Tom & I had ditched thoughts of heading back to the car that night. It was a much longer day than any of us had expected.

Despite how tired I was I didn’t sleep well, and we were all woken by an early morning thunderstorm rolling through at first light (5am). By 6am we were up and moving, Tom somewhat bemused since he figured we weren’t going anywhere till the storm had passed.

Once it passed we went our separate ways since our cars were parked in different directions. Tom & I were back at the car just before 9am, and having breakfast at a cafe in Lithgow by 10:30am. It was a hot and sunny day and there was a twinge of guilt at not being out in it Рuntil another severe thunderstorm swept across the state in the late afternoon. La Ni̱a is here for the summer it seems.

DSC04342

A dry-feet crossing

 

1 2 3 4 6